InfoPrint delivers Merrill Corporation next-generation workflow

Friday, March 26, 2010

Press release from the issuing company

Boulder, Colo. - InfoPrint Solutions Company, a joint venture between IBM and Ricoh, today announced that Merrill Corporation, a leading global provider of technology-enabled solutions for the financial, healthcare, real estate, legal and other corporate markets, has chosen InfoPrint Solution's Automated Document Factory (ADF) solution, powered by InfoPrint ProcessDirector (IPPD) as its strategic workflow technology platform. Merrill has deployed this multi-faceted, end-to-end, hardware-agnostic solution to manage and streamline its daily print operations. This effort will generate new business by ensuring the highest level of integrity is applied to sensitive documents such as healthcare enrollment kits.

In recent years, regulators have passed bills in the financial and healthcare industries that affect customer communications or impose violation penalties. These include the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH), Regulation Z (Truth in Lending), Unfair and Deceptive Acts or Practices (UDAP) and the Credit CARD Act 2009. In Merrill's case, a HIPAA-compliant workflow is extremely important and allows the company to provide top quality service to healthcare customers.

InfoPrint Solutions is supplying Merrill with a wide array of ADF workflow solutions driven by the IPPD workflow software platform. These solutions will help Merrill manage its heavy print volume and create separate, high-integrity workflows for its healthcare business. This combination will enable increased levels of job and mailpiece management from inception to output as it tracks work through various printers and finishing equipment including stitchers, perfect binders and inserters, managing complete document integrity throughout the entire process. InfoPrint Solution's ADF offering also interfaces with the United States Postal Service (USPS) Intelligent Mail system, providing delivery confirmation information directly back to Merrill's clients.

Merrill's ADF from InfoPrint Solutions will be deployable to multiple sites for fast speed-to-market, workload optimization and disaster recovery.

"We evaluated a number of offerings from other companies but determined that what InfoPrint Solutions could provide us was incomparable," said Jeff Weiss, Vice President of Technology at Merrill. "We now have an end-to-end solution from file receipt through output and distribution of the communication piece. Our solution now enables us to provide our customers with reporting and visibility at every step, whether record level, piece level or page level. This is a complex solution driven by technology today that doesn't exist in many of the offerings out there. We believe this will be a 'game changing' facet of our healthcare and financial services solution offerings."

A recent IDC survey found that 68 percent of respondents receive their ADF solutions from InfoPrint Solutions.* It is likely many of these companies have deployed the company's solutions to address the needs of HIPAA, Regulation Z and other federal regulations similar to Merrill.

"As a technology enabled print and fulfillment solution provider, Merrill is leading the way for companies with diverse technology environments and hybrid workflow needs. On one hand, they need to optimize their existing business and, on the other hand, they are expanding their capabilities to tap into new markets that have very stringent requirements," said Sandra Zoratti, Vice President, Global Solutions Marketing, InfoPrint Solutions. "We are excited that Merrill can leverage the power, flexibility and scalability of our software and professional services teams and are pleased to have Merrill as an important InfoPrint Solutions partner."

Automating print and mail processes has traditionally been a daunting task, but InfoPrint Solutions' technologies make it easier to achieve increased automation and higher productivity. An ADF connects disparate hardware, software and processes into one unified workflow with a single point of control. This can greatly reduce production and postal costs. Integrity improvements help to ensure each mailpiece is produced correctly with full accountability. Mailers in regulated sectors such as financial services, healthcare and insurance have been using ADFs for years as part of their cost savings and compliance initiatives.

Merrill's ADF Solution spans InfoPrint Solution's broad software portfolio including capabilities that manage print across various Océ and Xerox printers, enable automatic error detection and reprinting, monitor service level agreements, capture data and generate reports, interface with the USPS, enable management of multiple sites and more. The solution interfaces with Merrill's business systems to capture work tasks and provide extensive reporting. It leverages camera tracking from Ironsides Technology to monitor kit integrity across a variety of finishing devices. Ironsides' systems communicate back to InfoPrint ProcessDirector, which oversees the entire production process.